The Longitudinal Relationship Between Conversational Turn-Taking and Vocabulary Growth in Early Language Development.
Seamus Donnelly1,2, Evan Kidd1,2,3,4
1The Australian National University.
Child Development
|February 6, 2021
Summary
Early language development is a two-way street. More conversational turns with adults boost children's vocabulary growth, and growing vocabulary encourages more conversation.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Linguistics
- Child Language Acquisition
Background:
- Children learn language through social interaction.
- Early language acquisition is influenced by the child's linguistic environment.
- Conversational turn-taking is a key aspect of social interaction.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the longitudinal relationship between conversational turn-taking and vocabulary growth in infants.
- To examine the bidirectional influence of social interaction on early language development.
- To control for the quantity of adult words in the child's environment.
Main Methods:
- Longitudinal study of 122 English-acquiring children from 9 to 24 months.
- Daylong audio recordings collected every 3 months.
- Analysis of conversational turns, adult word count, and vocabulary growth via parental report.
Main Results:
- A bidirectional relationship was found between conversational turn-taking and vocabulary growth.
- Conversational engagement significantly predicted vocabulary expansion.
- Vocabulary size also predicted increased conversational engagement, independent of environmental word exposure.
Conclusions:
- Social interaction, specifically conversational turn-taking, plays a crucial role in early vocabulary acquisition.
- Language development is an interactive process, not just passive absorption.
- Findings support theories emphasizing social interaction as fundamental to language learning.
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